Today brought with it the latest wave of "free" NES games for Nintendo Switch Online. It's three games this month, plus a bonus: Metroid, Mighty Bomb Jack, and Twinbee, along with an "SP" version of Gradius that bumps you close to the end of the game and gives you a fully powered-up ship. Remember when we used to complain about only getting four or five games in a week on Virtual Console? Ah, those days seem so far away....

Snark aside, I decided to bump the next NES Works episode ahead to today, where it follows directly on the heels of last week's program (instead of bouncing over to a different platform chronology as per the publishing plan). As it happens, this latest NES Works coincides with one of today's NSO launches: Mighty Bomb Jack. On top of that, this week's episode also covers a game that appeared on NSO back at its debut, Solomon's Key.

Interestingly, both games come to us courtesy of Tecmo, who make their debut on NES Works here. And both are better games than their reputations might suggest, as the latest Video Chronicles episode explains:

While NES Works hasn't quite made its way to Metroid, its companion series Game Boy Works did tackle a Game Boy conversion of Twinbee—a series whose initial NES release didn't originally make it over to the U.S.

And you can also enjoy this look back at Gradius, which doesn't include footage of the stage unlocked by the SP version. It's a tough game.

This week's episode is really just the tip of the well-timed iceberg. NES Works has actually covered a majority of titles currently available on NSO, and you can catch up with them on the Games of Nintendo Switch Online playlist.